


Castle

by orphan_account



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/F, Falling In Love, Fluff and Angst, Forbidden Love, Friends to Lovers, Huntsman: Winter's War AU, Implied Sexual Content, fluff with an angsty ending
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-06
Updated: 2016-10-06
Packaged: 2018-08-19 21:06:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8224784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Drilled into their minds every day is that love made one weak, and those who were weak died in the unforgiving wasteland of the north. Like Peridot, who couldn't handle a butter knife to save her life.





	

__I'm headed straight for the castle  
They wanna make me their queen  
And there's an old man sitting on the throne that's saying that I probably shouldn't be so mean

_-Halsey_

 

* * *

 

 

They’re children in the icy northern plains. The soldiers come and Peridot watches with unadulterated horror as the hay-haired woman with a warm smile and milky skin that is her mother spears herself on sharp steel in a vain attempt to protect Peridot, watches as the burly man with the long beard and the wolfskins that is her father fights ferociously as she’s picked up and toted away, kicking and screaming. She’s loaded into the uncomfortable cart with itchy blankets and all the other sobbing children of the village. She cries and cries, cries until they reach the castle walls. The girl next to her is quiet, but there are no tears in her eyes. Her tan, freckled hands fist in the blankets and she shakes with anger.

“What's your name?” she whispers when they’re marched into the great hall of the Queen’s. Peridot looks up in shock and her sniveling ceases momentarily.

“Peridot,” she whispers back, clutching onto the girl’s arm now that she knows she isn't hostile. The girl looks alarmed, but doesn’t shake her off.

“My name’s Lapis. I’m nine,” her voice is as low as a nine year old can make it, still echoing through the strange room along with the shuffle of little feet and snuffling noses. The walls and floors shine with ice and polish, and it's almost enough to take Peridot’s mind off her mother’s dying face. Almost.

“I’m seven,” she mumbles back, lips clamping shut when something jingles. A woman strides into view from around a corner on the platform before them. She wears fine fabrics that Peridot has never seen before in her life, is draped in bright, grey metals that tinkle like the horrendous clang of swords in her village. She can’t see the eyes that belong to the woman, head covered in a great, extravagant shawl. A shorter, skinnier woman trails behind her as she makes her way to the center of the platform.

“We’re friends now,” Lapis says, and turns back to the spectacle before them. The woman’s voice is like honey when she speaks, sweet and rich and full of enticing goodness. Her skin is dark like the night and she speaks of weakness and love.

\--

Peridot is terrible with every weapon she lays her hands on, be it a spear, mace, sword, or bow. Even a dagger is too difficult to handle. Lapis picks up an axe and swings from the very first day, always finding her mark, or _a_ mark at the very least. Whether it be the armor of a frightened soldier, or the bloody red center of a target, the blunted blade of her axe always strikes home. She is always so happy, but Peridot is not. She is nine now, and Lapis is eleven. She is a failure, and Lapis is not.

Amethyst truly is no help, whip in hand and the sickening crack of it as she finds her target as well. “You’re trying too hard, P-Dot! Just do what feels natural!” she laughs, clapping Peridot hard on the back. Amethyst is ten and Peridot has known her since long before she was stolen from her home. The faces of her parents have long since faded from her mind, as well as the notion of love. Drilled into their minds every day is that love made one weak, and those who were weak died in the unforgiving wasteland of the north. Like Peridot, who couldn't handle a butter knife to save her life.

Amethyst’s laugh is raucous, so she sighs and shuffles away in the crusty snow, searching for Lapis. She is never hard to spot, lanky and tan with an untamable mop of pitch black atop her head.

\--

It’s another month before she finally finds her specialty. Little knives, balanced between her fingers, flicked towards her target. They land true, stick out of the straw sparring dummy. The knife is embedded in the arm of the dummy, but at least it had landed at all. Lapis hugs her tight and swings her around that night, both of them consumed by giddy laughter.

\--

She is fourteen, and Lapis is sixteen. She’d been moved out of the bunking house and into her own room two years ago. It had been a sad day for Peridot and Lapis alike, watching the older go. Peridot misses her silly antics and her company in general. She sees Lapis less and less, as the older girl’s training intensifies. Sparring with her is no easy feat, with her versatility of one handed, blunt weapons and her sheer skill. Peridot can use swords now, less awkwardly than before, but she is no master. It takes but a few moments most times for Lapis to disarm her and knock her aside. Still, Lapis is old enough for warfare now, so Peridot takes every moment that she can with Lapis with desperate, grasping hands. Even if that means having her butt handed to her in the sparring ring.

She is fourteen, and is moving to her own shared room, finally. Amethyst is her roommate, and though she’s sad that her best friend isn’t her choice, Amethyst is more than able to make up for it. Nights are passed with plots and pranks and eager giggling, and Peridot thinks that it isn't that bad. Two years until she can stand at Lapis’ side in battle.

\--

She is still fourteen when Lapis goes to battle for the first time, ready and anxious. She sits at the entrance to the gate for two hours with Amethyst as she watches Lapis disappear over the horizon on a black horse. Her heart hurts with something new that she doesn't want to think about. She’s happy for Lapis, of course, but terrified at the same time.

Breakfast isn't the same without her, lunch isn't the same without her, sparring isn't the same without her. Nothing is as fun anymore, Peridot realizes, when she sits on the bench in front of her and Amethyst’s building and muses on how empty the camp is. Amethyst joins her most days, staring into the white flurries that rain down around them as the sun sets a burning orange in the backdrop. She wonders if Lapis watches the sunset, too.

“It's been a month,” she's irritable, but tries to keep the bite out of her voice. Amethyst hasn't done anything wrong, “ _When_ are they coming back?”

“I’m as worried as you are, man. Pearl was war-age too and she marched off with Lapis. I miss her so much,” her voice is saturated in tiredness. Suddenly, Peridot understands the purple bags under her the curvier girl’s eyes. Nights on end spent fraying her own nerves with concern about Pearl’s wellbeing. Peridot can relate.

She twiddles her thumbs and sighs, leans her elbows on her knees and rests her head in her hands. It darkens quickly as the last rays of day slip over the horizon, biting cold creeping into her limbs, “She’s been there for me since the beginning,”

Amethyst is quiet for a moment, opens her mouth like she wants to speak but shuts it quickly. “Pearl is--,” she pauses again, and something hard sparkles in her eye. Her face twists in thought, “--Pearl is my, uh, closest friend,” her tone is weird. Peridot will never understand her.

They get up and sleep restlessly that night.

Lapis misses her birthday after a second month at war, and Peridot almost cries. She misses Lapis so much.

\--

She is fifteen when Lapis returns from her first battle. When the huntsmen crest the horizon, she and Amethyst whoop for joy. She bounces on the balls of her feet and tries to hold giddy laughter inside her chest, but it escapes nonetheless. All the innocent happiness in her body drains directly into the ground, however, when she catches sight of Lapis hunched over on a different, brown horse. She’s bloody and battered. Her deep blue eyes are haunted and her face is gaunt and pale. There’s a deep laceration in the center of her upper back where an enemy’s sword had struck true, and she curls up with Peridot in the younger’s bed that night.

“I don't like killing,” she whispers hoarsely, tired but plagued by guilt. Peridot gathers her in her stubby arms, careful to avoid the ugly brown bandaging pasted to Lapis’ upper back, and hugs her tightly, securely.

She takes time to consider her words, but when she finds them she mutters them as tenderly as she can into the black hair under her chin, “You had no choice,”

Lapis burrows her head into Peridot’s neck and latches onto her with all the strength she has left. Something hot leaks down her neck and soaks into her ragged nightshirt, and Lapis shakes like a leaf until she cries herself into exhaustion. Her stomach flutters with something she doesn't know the name of as Lapis snores in her arms. Peridot runs her short fingers through pitch black hair and whispers a promise to keep Lapis safe no matter the cost.

\--

She turns sixteen in another year, and Lapis comes and goes to battle. Every time she returns she looks slightly less disturbed, but never comfortable. Sometimes she sleeps in Peridot’s bed, when the nightmares are the worst and she can't find it in herself to spend the night with just her roommate.

Her face is sad when Peridot sharpens her swords and knives the night before her first taste of war. Lapis sits beside her, so close that their hips touch and Peridot’s skin crackles with static.

“You've got such a bright light in those pretty green eyes of yours,” she mumbles, lips quirking up when Peridot meets her gaze, “I don't wanna see death and war stamp it out,”

Her face goes ruddy at the compliment. She wheezes out a laugh and turns her face to look at the fire in front of them. They're alone, the closest huntsmen chatting two buildings away. Their voices are low and she can't understand what they're saying, “I'll make sure it stays,” she stares at the sword and whetstone in her hands before she adds, quietly, “Just for you,”

“Just for me?” Lapis smirks next to her, leaning forward to look at Peridot’s pasty face. She turns to Lapis, prepared so blurt out the first dumb retort that comes to mind, but her brain is wiped blank. Lapis is close, so close, and there's a brush of lips against her own. Her own face goes six shades darker and her heart leaps into her throat, “For luck,” Lapis whispers, standing and walking away without another word.

\--

War is horrible. It’s painful and disgusting and Peridot finds that blood is far too hot when it splatters her clothes and face, and she hates the feeling of sinking her sword into living flesh more than anything else in the whole world. She throws up what meager food she’d ingested earlier when they make camp that night and Lapis holds her close as she trembles. Apologies fall from the older girl’s lips and she looks just as haunted as she did the first day back home after her first time. She crawls out of her bedroll and curls up in Lapis’. She runs her nails over her cheeks and she isn't sure what’s dried blood and what's dried tears.

The next day, she's dragged off the ground by a frantic Lapis when a flail catches her in the forehead and she falls, unconscious. Lapis isn't there when she wakes, but she hears from astounded huntsmen that she marched back to the battlefield and took down twenty men before the battle ended and the opposition called a retreat.

The bandage is ugly and blood-soaked on her forehead. She's dizzy for two days and can't leave the camp.

\--

It leaves an ugly scar when she’s seventeen. Lapis is nineteen, and they laugh like they don't know what it's like to kick a screaming man off of the business end of a blade. The queen rejoices and a celebration is thrown when the first kingdom is conquered and Jasper knees before her with the crown of the dead King in her hands. The feast lasts for a week and Peridot gets her first taste of rum.

“It’s terrible!” she guffaws as Lapis forces back a cup of the offending booze, sputters and coughs and chokes on the fire that rakes down her throat and laughs along with Peridot when her ears and her nose grow red and she can't quite walk right. When midnight comes and Lapis falls asleep on her shoulder for the third time she escorts her back to her room, tipsy herself. The make it to the room, laughing and stumbling and hardly looking where they're going, but Lapis doesn't enter. She takes Peridot’s face in her hands and her mouth is hot when it connects with the younger girl’s.

It’s sloppy and Lapis hiccups through it, but electricity seizes her body and she can't help but wrap her arms around Lapis’ slender waist to hold her close. Through the fog of shock, it feels so right, so good, she's sure this is most _right_ thing she's ever done. Lapis pulls away with an obscene, wet sound and gapes at her with lidded eyes and a dopey grin as she fumbles with the door handle. Peridot’s mind is on fire from more than alcohol and she stares at the spot that Lapis stood moments ago until dark brown wood and grey cobblestones burn into her retinas. Consciousness leaves her like a flame leaves a candle with a gust of wind when she hits her mattress.

\--

“You kissed me last night,” her voice is low. Light reflecting off the snow hurts her eyes, hurts her head. Lapis is barely awake, groaning every five minutes and swearing off alcohol for the rest of her life. She sits upright at that. They’re at the edge of the river, far from all the noise of the citadel. All that they hear now is each other’s voices and the running of water.

Lapis fidgets her hands in the snow that soaks through their pants, blushes, “Can-can I do it again?”

Peridot turns bright red and Lapis laughs at her, mirth and happiness dancing on her face. It's far more beautiful than the silver robes and precious metals that flow down the queen’s form, far more beautiful than the licks of color that dance in the night sky occasionally. Her voice cracks when she speaks, low and raspy, “Yeah,”

Lapis’ laughter dies down in her throat and she leans closer to Peridot, hesitant. A cold hand encloses over her own where she leans on it in the snow. All she can see is Lapis, deep blue eyes and a heavy dusting of dark freckles over dark skin. Peridot connects them this time, and the feeling of right-ness returns. Warmth embedded in the pit of her stomach and the pounding of her heart in her ears as she shifts her hand in the snow, interlaces their fingers together. A frigid hand finds her shoulder and she shivers hard, but she doesn't want to break the kiss. She hopes it never ends.

The hand slides up her neck, through her hairline, runs reverently through her short, wild, blonde hair. Lapis breaks away when Peridot gasps and they breathe, eyes closed and hot breath mingling, “I feel weird when I'm around you,”

Peridot rests her ugly, scarred forehead against Lapis’, “Me too,”

Lapis brings their lips together again and for the first time in her life, Peridot distantly wants to run away and never return to her fortress, the kingdom without warmth and without love.

\--

They meet again three days later. Lapis has been busy, there has been no time. She catches Peridot’s wrist and tugs her into a side-alley next to the castle. Snow flurries gather in their hair as she shoves Peridot up against the freezing cobblestones and smashes their mouths together, “I like you a lot,” she whispers between fervent kisses. Slender fingers fist in her hair and she hardly remembers to return the sentiment.

\--

It's two weeks later that they learn how lovely lips feel on necks. Peridot has to cover her mouth to stop the moan trying to escape when Lapis nips at her jawline. They're pressed into a dark room in the queen’s castle, having slipped in unnoticed twenty minutes ago. They're free today, they can spend as long as they like in each other’s arms. Peridot runs her freezing hands up Lapis’ stomach to spite her and laughs when the taller girl jumps away and curses. It's sweet and precious and Peridot forgets that the world outside the dark, cold room exists for a while.

\--

She has to wear a scarf for a week afterwards. Lapis got carried away and little purple marks litter her crystal-white neck. She scowls like death and Lapis can hardly hold back her laughter.

\--

The queen gathers them to call on another war. Lapis’ face loses its color and Peridot feels like she wants to vomit when she remembers that Amethyst is old enough now. Another kingdom to the east, sitting in the Queen’s frigid wasteland. More land, more food, more money, more huntsmen to train.

Amethyst’s face is heavy with too many emotions for Peridot to read when she passes her after the first battle. She wants to comfort her, but Pearl is already curled up next to her with a blanket and and whispered consolations. She wonders if they have what her and Lapis have. She hopes so, but she hopes not at the same time. It’s illegal. She doesn't want Amethyst to face prosecution.

She sleeps with her face buried in Lapis’ neck like she had during her first war, but it means so much more. She wonders if others know. She hopes not.

\--

“Do you know what love feels like?” Amethyst asks one night after their return. Another group of troops is cycled out. She hopes that they win the stupid war so that they won't have to leave again until the Queen’s bloodlust spikes.

She doesn't think, as usual, before she speaks, “Yeah,”

“What?” Amethyst bolts upright in her bed, eyes wide in the candlelight of their little room, “How?”

Her blood runs cold and her tongue is heavy in her mouth until a lie pops into her mind, “We both had parents, I know what their love feels like,”

Amethyst huffs and flops back down, “That was years ago. I mean loving someone else,”

“Wouldn't know,” she mumbles, turns away. Her heart hurts and she thinks of nothing but Lapis. Was it love?

\--

Lapis gapes at her after the words leave her mouth. They're together at the bank of the river again, a mile away from the citadel. The sky is clear and the snow hurts her eyes again, but not from a hangover.

“I love you, too,” she whispers, just for Peridot to hear. It feels right in her chest, so that must mean it’s true.

“We’re officially outlaws,” Peridot plays with strands of black hair and Lapis smiles up at her. Hands fist in the collar of her vest and Lapis falls back, face framed by soft hair and white snow. “I’m gonna kiss all your freckles. Every single one,” she blurts, and Lapis laughs. She straddles the skinnier woman and they kiss and laugh, and she wonders for the thousandth time why anything like this was ever considered weak.

They roll around until Lapis lands on top, face sweaty and a fire in her eyes. She undoes the first few buttons of her own vest and her chest heaves, “Let's do something reckless,” she breathes.

Peridot freezes and grips Lapis’ hips when she shucks the vest and her furs and starts on her undershirt, tan skin peeking out. The curve of a freckled breast is visible when Lapis makes it halfway down her torso and Peridot’s breath catches in her throat. The last button comes undone and Lapis finds her hand, “Is it really a good idea to shed layers in the freezing cold?”

“What, you want to screw in your room? I’m sure Amethyst won't mind,” Lapis sneers, and tugs on her hand again. She trails it up scorching, muscled skin and Lapis shivers hard.

“Is _that_ what we’re doing?” Peridot raises a brow and smirks. Lapis’ undershirt hangs off her like a blanket, barely obscuring her figure. Peridot wants to tear it off.

Lapis flushes when Peridot’s hand finds the underside of her breast. She hisses and arches when a frozen thumb runs over her nipple, “What exactly did you think I was doing?”

“I’m not sure. Most things you do confuse me. I’ve learned to just go with it,” she teases, and Lapis huffs good-naturedly. Lapis lets out jerky, breathy moans as Peridot explores with her hands and Lapis starts to fumble with the buttons of Peridot’s overcoat. She’s twenty when she loses her virginity, and Lapis is twenty-two when she loses hers next to a rushing river and hardly a mile away from a woman who would kill them if she knew.

\--

They slip into darkened rooms more and more often after that, and people grow suspicious. Peridot bites her lip hard enough that iron leaks onto her tongue so that she doesn't cry out and her hands fist painfully in black hair as she leans on a cobblestone wall for support. Her legs tremble like dead trees in a blizzard and her breath comes uneven as Lapis kneels like a sinner at church with her head wedged between Peridot’s thighs. She never lasts long when fingers slip inside, and neither does Lapis when their positions are reversed.

\--

“I’ve decided that you're my wife,” Lapis whispers into her ear one day, peppering kisses and nips along Peridot’s jawline. Something cold is pressed into her palm. Peridot pulls back from her to meet her gaze, full of love and adoration and _surety_. Her eyes well with tears and she presses salty kisses to Lapis’ mouth and laughs, despite Lapis’ concern at her tears. When she glances down, there's a necklace in her hand. The charm is small and blue and shaped like a tear.

“I’ve decided I'm so in love that I agree to be your wife,” she says in between kisses, and Lapis squeals with glee. They laugh and cry and run their hands over each other and bask in the beauty that they created with their own two hands. Peridot is twenty-one when she is married, and Lapis is twenty-three.

\--

Other huntsmen surround them in the courtyard, and their faces wear masks of stone. Peridot’s blood runs with ice when weapons are drawn. Lapis draws knives from her belt before Peridot can think.

Something jingles like bells and keys, and the queen’s voice rings through the air, “I know this story,” there is sadness lacing her voice, melancholy and maliciousness, “The girl goes in secret to meet her one true love. I wonder how it ends this time,” the smile on her face is sad as well, but Peridot can only see the danger lurking underneath. The queen is volatile, angry, “I gave you both everything, and in return, you betray me. For love,”

“We’ve fought your wars,” Peridot interrupts softly, “We’ve done enough,”

“Please my queen, let us go,” Lapis tries,  
but the queen’s face only contorts in disgust.

“Do not beg me. It is _weak_. _You_ are weak,” she sighs down at her hands and Peridot’s nerves are fraying by the second. Her fellow huntsmen shuffle around her and she can feel apprehension in the air, “Do you want to leave?”

A look passes between Peridot and Lapis. Their queen is not a merciful one.

“Very well, go to each other,” she tuts, and Lapis moves first. A spear is thrust in her way and the queen goes on sardonically, “If you can. Shouldn't be hard, love conquers all, so I've heard,”

Push turns to shove and Lapis is the first to break out fighting. She grunts and draws her axe and swings, and Peridot follows suit with her sword. She holds back, only hits to disarm. They are her brothers and sisters, and she refuses to hurt them. They don't seem to carry the same mindset, however. She bleeds from small cuts on her arms and face, and she swears she's cracked a rib when a pole finds her side.

When enough of the huntsmen lie on the ground and Lapis and Peridot still stand, the queen cries out and raises a wall of ice between them as thick as two men. A choked sob escapes Peridot’s throat and she punches the ice as hard as she can as Lapis stares desperately at her from the other side.

Jasper moves behind her, sword in hand. Her face pales and her heart stops when a meaty hand finds Lapis’ shoulder and then there's red, so much red as she slides shakily down the icy barrier. Peridot screams obscenities, there's hot liquid rolling down her face and she hits the ice again and again. It cracks and her knuckles bleed before she's hit in the back of the head and she falls unconscious. The last thing she sees is Lapis’ mouth dripping red and cloudy eyes fluttering up at her.

She is empty when they throw her in the river, and she hopes for death when the cold laps at her bones and she loses feeling in all but her torso. She is twenty two when she dies, she muses, and Lapis is twenty four.

She awakens on a river bank, heaving and curses every god known to man for the fact that her heart still beats in her chest. She doesn't want to live any longer. Her arms work to drag her through the muddy ground and she vomits water and bile. No snow graces the ground and the land is dead as she casts her gaze around, despondent.

**Author's Note:**

> I watched Huntsman: Winter's War the other day and I'm not gonna lie. I loved it so damn much. I had to make an AU about it cause I'm trash.
> 
> Also, the format of this work is more or less inspired by a fic by InsominiacArrest, it's called "And I will grow with you" and you should go read it.


End file.
